Speaker 1: In this episode, The Court Watchers Aaron Patterson's police interview.
Speaker 1: When asked why she hosted her ex partner's family for lunch,
Speaker 1: the accused killer replies, I love them, and that she
Speaker 1: thinks Simon hated the relationship they all share. Asked if
Speaker 1: she owns a food dehydrator, she replies no.
Speaker 2: Victoria's mushroom Mystery, the mushroom lunch that claimed three lives.
Speaker 3: An Australian family's meal is now the center of a
Speaker 3: homicide investigation. The bizarre tragedy now grabbing global headlines. Aaron
Speaker 3: Patterson's alleged victims died after eating a family lunch she'd
Speaker 3: serve them at her home.
Speaker 2: I cannot think of another investigation that has generated this
Speaker 2: level of media and public interest.
Speaker 1: Four of the guests of that lunch were much loved
Speaker 1: members of this church.
Speaker 4: Only one will ever return.
Speaker 3: People are feeling very heavy with having lost such wonderful people.
Speaker 1: Today, Aaron Pattison remained here inside her home continue to
Speaker 1: plead her innocence in a court room in Country Victoria,
Speaker 1: Aaron Patterson is on trial accused of using death cap
Speaker 1: mushrooms to kill.
Speaker 4: She's pleaded not guilty to murdering three of her former in.
Speaker 1: Laws and attempting to kill a fourth, the town's church pastor.
Speaker 1: It's up to the jurors to decide what happened when
Speaker 1: Patterson's loved ones sat down to eat. So the jury
Speaker 1: has been told that the last witness has taken the stand,
Speaker 1: and this is a homicide detective. We'll get to his
Speaker 1: evidence a little later in the episode because this is
Speaker 1: where the jury has been shown for the first time
Speaker 1: a recording of a police interview with Aaron Patterson.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right. There was an almost twenty one minute
Speaker 3: long section of her police interview that was played to
Speaker 3: the jury today. They were told that it appeared to
Speaker 3: skip at times, some of it was taken out, but
Speaker 3: not to turn their minds to that and instead focus
Speaker 3: on the twenty one or minutes of interview that was played.
Speaker 3: But we had an number of witnesses that started off
Speaker 3: the evidence today before we got to this detective, Detective
Speaker 3: Steven epping Stall.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so Sally Anne Atkinson, who people might remember from
Speaker 1: our last episode, she was still continuing her evidence on
Speaker 1: the day that we're talking about, and that meant that
Speaker 1: she was undergoing cross examination with the defense now she
Speaker 1: is an official with the Victorian Health Department. She works
Speaker 1: in the public health side of things, and she's told
Speaker 1: the jury that her role was sort of trying to
Speaker 1: investigate where particularly the mushrooms from the lunch may have
Speaker 1: come from in case there needed to be some sort
Speaker 1: of public health response to that. Now today, when she
Speaker 1: was questioned by a Colin Mandy sc Aaron Patterson's barrister,
Speaker 1: at times, it was quite firey.
Speaker 4: In the courtroom.
Speaker 1: She and mister Mandy were told by Justice Biale at
Speaker 1: one point stop speaking over each other, yeah, and for
Speaker 1: her just to answer the question. She was being asked
Speaker 1: that the prosecution would re clarify anything in re examination
Speaker 1: if they needed to, and also for mister Mandy to
Speaker 1: stop speaking over the top of her. So it was
Speaker 1: quite back and forth, and she was really staunched, wasn't
Speaker 1: she on particular elements of her evidence When she.
Speaker 3: Was Mandy challenged her quite a number of times on
Speaker 3: her memory and recollection and her notes in particular that
Speaker 3: she took following conversations that she had with Aaron Patterson
Speaker 3: in that early August time period, and she was asked repeatedly,
Speaker 3: you know, could you have heard this instead of this,
Speaker 3: or that instead of that, and she was like, no, no, no,
Speaker 3: this is the evidence I've given. This is my memory. Yes,
Speaker 3: I have my notes here and they may not have
Speaker 3: been as extensive as what I'm sitting here telling you
Speaker 3: today and telling the jury today, but she was really
Speaker 3: adamant that her memory was her memory, and she didn't budge,
Speaker 3: she didn't accept any of Colin Colin Mandy's suggestions really
Speaker 3: of maybe something else could have happened, or maybe Aaron
Speaker 3: Patterson said a different suburb at a different time, or
Speaker 3: explained you know, did she actually say to you on
Speaker 3: the phone to the witness that she got the mushrooms
Speaker 3: on a Friday and the witnesses seat of explaining all, well, noh,
Speaker 3: my memory, she said she got you know, majority of
Speaker 3: the three mines, so that they were really looking at
Speaker 3: these finer details of her statement and comparing that to
Speaker 3: what she was saying on the witness stand and.
Speaker 1: As you said, to her notes and part of what
Speaker 1: was mentioned. There was this doctor Connor McDermott who'd initially
Speaker 1: made contact with her. She was really questioned on whether
Speaker 1: at any point he had said the suburb glen Waverley
Speaker 1: and she said no, definitely not Glen Waverley. She remembered
Speaker 1: it as Mount Waverley. And then also on the fact
Speaker 1: that she said initially in her evidence that what he'd
Speaker 1: relayed to her was that maybe the dried mushrooms were frozen,
Speaker 1: she said yes that. When Colin Mandy challenged her, saying,
Speaker 1: maybe he never said that, would you accept that, she
Speaker 1: said no, he did say they're initially frozen. But the
Speaker 1: more information came, and those other finer points that you've
Speaker 1: mentioned there included when she was being asked about whether
Speaker 1: Aaron Patterson had potentially used the mushrooms previously in a
Speaker 1: past edition, she went back and forth a number of times,
Speaker 1: which people will have heard in the last episode that
Speaker 1: she felt that it was unclear the first time she
Speaker 1: spoke to Aaron Patterson if they'd been used or not.
Speaker 1: And she really was questioned by Colin Mandy on the
Speaker 1: fact in her notes she'd said that they'd been these
Speaker 1: mushrooms have been put away in a tupperware container. That
Speaker 1: surely that meant they hadn't been used, and she said no,
Speaker 1: My understanding was that I still wasn't quite sure. That's
Speaker 1: why I wanted to clarify that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and the witness said Penny. Ultimately their investigation, which
Speaker 3: went from about the first of the fourth of August
Speaker 3: twenty twenty three ended the formally ended as they tended
Speaker 3: a report about the eleventh of August twenty twenty three,
Speaker 3: and she explained on page six of this report that
Speaker 3: ultimately they found although the initial information suggested that there
Speaker 3: could be this mushroom poisoning and that may have been
Speaker 3: purchased from some Asian grocery store, their investigation established it
Speaker 3: was highly unlikely commercial mushroom supply chains had been contaminated.
Speaker 4: And she also said because of that there.
Speaker 3: Was a very low risk, deemed a very low risk
Speaker 3: to public safety, and that it was confined to this
Speaker 3: lunch group.
Speaker 1: And she was asked as well about the when she
Speaker 1: was told by Aaron Patterson in her evidence that there
Speaker 1: may have been at glen Waverley as one of the suburbs,
Speaker 1: whether she passed it on to one of the council
Speaker 1: officers who was investigating, and her evidence was yes that
Speaker 1: she had passed that on, she potentially hadn't then re
Speaker 1: followed it up, which is what Colin Mandy was asking her,
Speaker 1: But she was adamant she'd pass that on and again
Speaker 1: that those were the findings of that report. That this
Speaker 1: investigation then from the eleventh of August was all finished
Speaker 1: with nothing else added. So the next witness to enter
Speaker 1: the courtroom was from the homicide squad. His name is
Speaker 1: Detective Sergeant Luke Farrell. Now he was wearing a navy
Speaker 1: blue suit a blue tie, and he entered the courtroom
Speaker 1: and began his evidence by standing answering most of his
Speaker 1: questions rather than sitting down. He had his hands clasped
Speaker 1: in front of him. And what he was taken through
Speaker 1: was a search warrant that was conducted on the fifth
Speaker 1: of August at Aaron Patterson's home. And confirming the fact
Speaker 1: that he was a part of executing this search warrant.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he said that he performed his investigative duties at
Speaker 3: that time in early August alongside a team of others,
Speaker 3: including the detective epping Stoo, who we know is the
Speaker 3: police informant who essentially is in charge of making sure
Speaker 3: the investigation is completed or followed through with. On August five,
Speaker 3: twenty twenty three, Detective Sergeant Luke Farrell explained that he
Speaker 3: attended Aaron Patterson's home in ly and Gatha to execute
Speaker 3: a search warrant that police had obtained, and in that
Speaker 3: search warrant was items of interest for police to look
Speaker 3: for food waste, including mushrooms, food packaging, mobile phones, and
Speaker 3: electronic devices.
Speaker 1: And he noted in his evidence that Aaron Patterson's two
Speaker 1: children were home at the time that this warrant was executed,
Speaker 1: and that he was sort of asked as part of
Speaker 1: the questioning whether that was a sensitivity that police were
Speaker 1: aware was of, and he said it certainly was, so
Speaker 1: there was a certain way they were going about this,
Speaker 1: and he was taken through that when they arrived at
Speaker 1: the home.
Speaker 3: About eleven forty am Penny that.
Speaker 1: There had been a conversation and he had to check
Speaker 1: his notes and sort of a transcript on this, but
Speaker 1: he confirms that, yes, there was a conversation where he
Speaker 1: spoke to Aaron Patterson and confirmed to her that two
Speaker 1: of the lunch guests had actually passed away, those being
Speaker 1: Heather Wilkinson and Gail Patterson. And his words on the
Speaker 1: stand that her reaction to that was that she seemed
Speaker 1: surprised and that she said who died and that's when
Speaker 1: sort of more of this information was given on who
Speaker 1: these two people were and exactly what time this had happened,
Speaker 1: and what police knew at that point, because we know
Speaker 1: three lunch guests had died, but at this particular point
Speaker 1: they say they.
Speaker 4: Were only aware of two.
Speaker 1: So now, as his evidence continued, there was a number
Speaker 1: of still images shown up on the big screens in
Speaker 1: the courtroom, and it was explained that these were taken
Speaker 1: from a video that was taken by an investigator who
Speaker 1: was filming as they conducted this search Wererant and that
Speaker 1: showed a number of items at Aaron Patterson's home, including
Speaker 1: the kitchen cupboards and things that were in the dishwasher
Speaker 1: and those kitchen cupboards.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so while Luke Farrell was assigned, he said as
Speaker 3: the team leader of the search, he had other officers
Speaker 3: with him, one who's in charge of photographing the items
Speaker 3: and filming the items, and another one who was in
Speaker 3: charge of female officer seeing a Constable Crawford who was
Speaker 3: recording them all in an exhibition log. And then he
Speaker 3: took the jury through the time of that search and
Speaker 3: the end. He said that search went for over about
Speaker 3: four hours, but started with and the pictures that were
Speaker 3: shown started with some kitchen drawers. There were white kitchen
Speaker 3: drawers and they had black handles, penny, and inside it,
Speaker 3: he said, on the bottom left hand draw there was
Speaker 3: a Sunbeam manual there. He said, it was on top
Speaker 3: of two piles of documents that the rear of the files,
Speaker 3: and that was one of the first photographs will be shown.
Speaker 1: And then as it sort of moved through these kitchen
Speaker 1: draws and this dishwasher that we mentioned as well, we
Speaker 1: could see a number of plates in the court and
Speaker 1: he was asked about these different plates.
Speaker 4: In one of the drawers there was what appeared to
Speaker 4: be a stack.
Speaker 1: Of darker colored plates at the back, and then a
Speaker 1: brighter white with bright colored plainbow stripes, yeah, at the front.
Speaker 1: And then in the dishwasher there also appeared to be
Speaker 1: more of these darker colored plates as well as a
Speaker 1: white plate, and then on the opposite side to that
Speaker 1: a white or light colored plate with some sort of
Speaker 1: drawing or pattern on that. And he was asked a
Speaker 1: number of questions about sort of can you see this
Speaker 1: and what color is it? And he did note in
Speaker 1: his evidence sometimes that because of the way things were stacked, well,
Speaker 1: I can't confirm exactly what color that is or what
Speaker 1: the other side of that color is. But he went
Speaker 1: through all of these different sort of plate objects, but
Speaker 1: then also moving on to these electronic objects.
Speaker 4: The jury was shown a number of.
Speaker 1: Photos of a computer which they were told was a
Speaker 1: cool Master computer.
Speaker 4: A black, quite large box.
Speaker 1: People may not always remember if you think of a computer,
Speaker 1: you might think of a laptop, but an actual box
Speaker 1: that was shown to the jury, as well as a
Speaker 1: couple of other electronic devices.
Speaker 3: So they were in the Sun's bedroom inside a wardrobe
Speaker 3: and the doors had been opened, and the photographs showed
Speaker 3: one of them being in that wardrobe and a couple
Speaker 3: of them where they were taken out in photographs separately.
Speaker 3: And it wasn't the only room that was searched as
Speaker 3: part of the investigation, Penny. There was also a search
Speaker 3: further of the kitchen. We know that they went into
Speaker 3: the butler's pantry. There was some kitchen scales in there
Speaker 3: that were photographed, and then on the kitchen bench, the
Speaker 3: detective was explaining that he found a cookbook and he
Speaker 3: said it was in this particular position when he found it.
Speaker 3: Now that position was between a microwave and the stove.
Speaker 3: The pages. The book was closed, and he said he
Speaker 3: found it. There was a piece of tissue almost used
Speaker 3: as a bookmark, but it was otherwise in that closed position.
Speaker 3: And it was then picture number nine the jury was
Speaker 3: shown where he located what he explained to the jury
Speaker 3: was a recipe of relevance.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Now he said that wasn't a bookmark page as such,
Speaker 3: but there was this page of beef Wellington recipe, and
Speaker 3: he said that page was spatted in cooking.
Speaker 4: Yeah, in this particular book.
Speaker 1: It was shown to the jury a number of photos
Speaker 1: the front sort of and then throughout the.
Speaker 4: Recipe sort of process.
Speaker 1: The book itself is a recipe tin eats book by
Speaker 1: Nagi Mahashi, and it is called Dinner. So they were
Speaker 1: shown this dark covered cookbook that was sitting on that
Speaker 1: kitchen bench. And then as it went through these number
Speaker 1: of other images, was the recipe for beef Wellington, and
Speaker 1: you could see a large photo of what appeared to
Speaker 1: be a cooks beef Wellington sort of cut in half
Speaker 1: so that you could see that quite a.
Speaker 4: Medium rare meat.
Speaker 1: There as well as then some photographic steps and some
Speaker 1: writing on different pages, and a photo as well of
Speaker 1: the top of this recipe of the beef Wellington sitting
Speaker 1: in a tin baked pastry almost plattered on top. So
Speaker 1: there were quite a few steps that were shown to
Speaker 1: the jury, and we will explain a little bit more
Speaker 1: in some of the later evidence, some of what the
Speaker 1: other detective mentioned when it came to that particular book.
Speaker 3: But there was quite a bit of conversation as well, Penny.
Speaker 3: I know you mentioned before about the plates, but that
Speaker 3: was something that there was a bit of back and
Speaker 3: forth conversation about looking at these plates from both the
Speaker 3: prosecution and the defense when they were asking Luke Fowl
Speaker 3: about these photographs, and you mentioned earlier there was some
Speaker 3: darker colored plates on the bottom, and he later confirmed
Speaker 3: in his evidence that it was like a reddish color.
Speaker 3: The top was a reddish color and the bottom of
Speaker 3: the plate was darker, and they were stacked vertically, some
Speaker 3: larger and some smaller. Inside that bottom shelf of the dishwasher,
Speaker 3: on the outside of those reddish colored plates was a
Speaker 3: couple of white plates, and then above the dishwasher on
Speaker 3: the kitchen bench was another couple of piles of plates
Speaker 3: as well that appeared to still have food on them
Speaker 3: and hadn't been washed.
Speaker 4: Just yet.
Speaker 3: And then also the witness was explaining that they found
Speaker 3: this fruit platter inside the fridge and also there was
Speaker 3: a jug of gravy. These were some of the exhibits
Speaker 3: that they were logging and taking photographs of as they
Speaker 3: walked through the house.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and there was also a bit of questioning around
Speaker 1: the handing over of a mobile phone. So we've heard
Speaker 1: about all of these different items that were cataloged. There
Speaker 1: was another mobile phone taken from a room and a
Speaker 1: few other things, a tablet, and it was mentioned whether
Speaker 1: these different things were found in the children's rooms, and
Speaker 1: then also in a bedroom that was called bedroom too,
Speaker 1: that they believed to be Aaron Patterson's bedroom.
Speaker 3: But this phone was a different one. Penny Yes, was
Speaker 3: right at the end of the search. Warrant Luke Farrell
Speaker 3: explained it was about three point thirty pm. We were
Speaker 3: shown actual footage of this conversation. It was video recorded
Speaker 3: and we have Aaron Patterson sitting on the left hand
Speaker 3: side of a kitchen table in the dining room area
Speaker 3: and on the right hand side was the detective and
Speaker 3: somebody was filming in the in front of them. We
Speaker 3: could see the kitchen towards the back of Aaron Patterson.
Speaker 3: But there was a conversation that began that was asking
Speaker 3: that Luke Farrell was asking Aaron Patterson, did you have
Speaker 3: a mobile phone? Could she handed over? And we saw
Speaker 3: that in front of her on the kitchen table, Penny,
Speaker 3: it was a mobile phone in an orange case.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And as this video was being played to the court,
Speaker 1: and it was said through some of Luke Farrell's evidence
Speaker 1: as well, that he asked Aaron Patterson, can you hand
Speaker 1: the phone over? And she sort of appeared to say yes,
Speaker 1: and she physically handed that to him, and then he said,
Speaker 1: you know, does it have a pin code? And he
Speaker 1: said in his evidence that she gave a four digit
Speaker 1: and a six digit pin But what we could hear
Speaker 1: when we were listening to that video was two different
Speaker 1: pins that had slightly different numbers in them. And as
Speaker 1: she handed it over, he sort of then went to
Speaker 1: access it and they were both kind of touching it
Speaker 1: and looking at it scrolling in a way at the
Speaker 1: same time as she's leaning over the table, and then
Speaker 1: she said, oh oh, and it was sort of this
Speaker 1: like bumbling moment where he then clarified through his evidence
Speaker 1: as well that he didn't actually need a pin code
Speaker 1: to get into.
Speaker 4: This device locked.
Speaker 1: Yeah, despite being given those two different numbers that they
Speaker 1: weren't needed at all. So that was the first time
Speaker 1: that the jury's actually seen vision where you can hear
Speaker 1: some audio of Aaron Patterson. So they were shown that
Speaker 1: video today. But as we've mentioned previously, they are later
Speaker 1: shown this police interview as well, so there'll be more
Speaker 1: that they hear of Aaron Patterson's voice. But after he
Speaker 1: was spoken to by the prosecution, this particular homicide detective
Speaker 1: was cross examined by the defense, particularly on some of
Speaker 1: those plates in the dishwasher.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: During his cross examination by Colin Mandy sc the witness
Speaker 3: was asked about did anybody film directly those plates, and
Speaker 3: he said no, they did not. He was asked whether
Speaker 3: or not they were an item of interest and he
Speaker 3: said yes, he was aware. He was asked again, why
Speaker 3: did police not take any photos of each of these plates,
Speaker 3: and he said no, no, we did not. He was
Speaker 3: also asked whether or not any of the plates were seized,
Speaker 3: and he said the only plate he could recall being
Speaker 3: seized was that one from the fridge, the one that
Speaker 3: had the fruit on it. And then the questioning then
Speaker 3: went into the color of the plates again, but that
Speaker 3: was really the end of his evidence.
Speaker 1: And then the jury was told that they were hearing
Speaker 1: from the last prosecution witness, being the informant, Detective epping Stall,
Speaker 1: and we'll be back after a short break with his evidence,
Speaker 1: including what the jury was played from this police interview.
Speaker 1: So Detective Leading Senior Constable Stephen Eppingstall took his place
Speaker 1: on the witness stand. Now he's also wearing a susan.
Speaker 1: The jury has seen him sitting in the courtroom throughout
Speaker 1: parts of this trial, often in the front row with
Speaker 1: other police. But he took to the witness stand and
Speaker 1: again he also stood like his colleague as he delivered
Speaker 1: his evidence.
Speaker 4: And he was.
Speaker 1: Initially sort of asked a little bit just about who
Speaker 1: he is and his involvement in the investigation.
Speaker 4: And what is an informant, Yeah, and that he is.
Speaker 1: Attached to the homicide squad. And he answered his questions
Speaker 1: in a very particular way. So to set the scene,
Speaker 1: we'll start by giving you a little bit of the
Speaker 1: evidence as the court heard it. Now this is voiced
Speaker 1: by actors, but this is Detective Eppingstall and Jane Warren
Speaker 1: from the prosecution.
Speaker 5: Now, the informant is a lead investigator, a signed to
Speaker 5: a particular investigation, Is that right?
Speaker 4: That is correct?
Speaker 5: Yes, responsible for directing the investigation, yes, ma'am, and responsible
Speaker 5: for compiling all evidence and producing the brief of evidence
Speaker 5: in relation to that matter.
Speaker 2: Yes, ma'am.
Speaker 6: Okay.
Speaker 5: Now I want to ask you firstly about the commencement
Speaker 5: of your involvement in this matter. On one August twenty
Speaker 5: twenty three, were you rostered to work in your role
Speaker 5: at the homicide squad?
Speaker 2: Yes, I was, ma'am.
Speaker 4: Yes, okay.
Speaker 5: And on that day did the homicide squad receive notification
Speaker 5: of a reported mass food poisoning event that had occurred
Speaker 5: at Gibson Street, land Gatha.
Speaker 2: Yes, ma'am.
Speaker 1: Now, at this point the judge intervened Justice Spiel, as
Speaker 1: we have heard him throughout the trial. He piped up
Speaker 1: with with something and he basically said to this particular witness,
Speaker 1: you don't have to say mam every time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he did, and there was a lot of laughter
Speaker 3: in the court room at that time. The informant smiled.
Speaker 3: We know, we've got a packed courtroom with members of
Speaker 3: the public. Everyone was smiling. Even the jury were having
Speaker 3: a bit of a giggle at this time, and he.
Speaker 1: Sort of then said, oh, yes, And when he was
Speaker 1: asked the next question and the next sort of series
Speaker 1: of questions, he very clearly said yes. But as you're
Speaker 1: hear throughout this evidence, it is something that occasionally seems
Speaker 1: seems to slip back in in his style of answering questions.
Speaker 1: Now he was taken through the fact that he was
Speaker 1: also at this search warrant on the fifth of August
Speaker 1: that was conducted at Aaron Patterson's house with Luke Farrell.
Speaker 1: And when he was asked again about as Luke Farrell
Speaker 1: was about Aaron Patterson being notified that two of the
Speaker 1: lunch guests had died, he said, after that detective told
Speaker 1: her that that he then actually sort of took her
Speaker 1: aside and had a little bit more of a chat
Speaker 1: with her about the fact that these two people had
Speaker 1: passed away.
Speaker 3: You're at that point, he explained, so taking us back
Speaker 3: in the timeline a little bit of the first of
Speaker 3: August twenty twenty three, homicide got a notification of this
Speaker 3: mass food poisoning. It was the third of August, a
Speaker 3: couple of days later that the homicide squad really took
Speaker 3: charge of the investigation, and then Epingstear was explaining that
Speaker 3: he had then by the fourth of August, received notification
Speaker 3: that Heather Wilkinson had passed away, and he got his colleagues,
Speaker 3: seeing a Constable Crawford, to start looking through bank records
Speaker 3: and phone records and alike, and he said it was
Speaker 3: at this point that a transaction of interest was identified,
Speaker 3: and this was a bank transaction. He explained to the
Speaker 3: jury ultimately where he says the accused went to the
Speaker 3: Kunwara transfer station and they found a black dehydrator that
Speaker 3: had been deposited there, and that they also found the
Speaker 3: CCTV and a like. And then it was at six
Speaker 3: forty seven pm on the fourth of August twenty twenty three,
Speaker 3: he said he then received a notification that Gail Patterson
Speaker 3: had died. And he explained to the jury that the
Speaker 3: homicide squad don't always investigate debts or suspicious deaths. Often
Speaker 3: they will come and help with complex cases to assist
Speaker 3: the coroner these coronial investigations, So at this point it
Speaker 3: sort of not unusual for them to get involved. But
Speaker 3: it really was that fifth of August twenty twenty three
Speaker 3: when he visited the home with this warrant and the
Speaker 3: other officer's penny, as you just mentioned that their jobs
Speaker 3: really began. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So, as he explained through his evidence, initially they were
Speaker 1: coronial investigators is the word he used. That local sea eyes,
Speaker 1: which is local criminal investigation branches, can't always deal with
Speaker 1: some cases that the coroner might want to look at,
Speaker 1: so they were doing that. But we know that by
Speaker 1: the time of this search warrant and a little bit
Speaker 1: before that, the homicide squad had carriage of this investigation.
Speaker 4: It was their case.
Speaker 1: And then when this search warrant began to unfold, after
Speaker 1: he had an initial conversation with Aaron Patterson, he was
Speaker 1: taken through sort of different elements of the search and
Speaker 1: he noted that this recipe tin EAT's book had been
Speaker 1: found on the benches the jury had previously heard from
Speaker 1: Luke Farrell's evidence, and he was asked about sort of
Speaker 1: being directed to that page, and he said he and
Speaker 1: Aaron Patterson were in a different room at that time,
Speaker 1: to the kitchen, but that she had indicated that would
Speaker 1: be a page around two hundred and fifty. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: that sure enough when they looked, they found that this
Speaker 1: was actually two hundred and fifty two was the page
Speaker 1: the recipe was on.
Speaker 4: He was also asked quite.
Speaker 1: A bit about how the mobile phone situation worked and
Speaker 1: how also Aaron Patterson was being sort of either supervised
Speaker 1: or not during this search warrant, and he said that
Speaker 1: pretty much all of the time during the search warrant
Speaker 1: there was always someone escorting her, but that there was
Speaker 1: a period for around twenty to thirty minutes where she
Speaker 1: was in a room of the home and they were
Speaker 1: letting her use her mobile phone, the same mobile phone
Speaker 1: he says, that was later handed over in the video
Speaker 1: that the Juri had just seen with Luke Farrell.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he recalled that Aaron Patterson said that she needed
Speaker 3: to talk and make arrangements for her daughter to attend ballet,
Speaker 3: and right from the start he agreed that she had
Speaker 3: this phone with her for about four hours of the
Speaker 3: police search. That was the only time he really remembered
Speaker 3: that she was left alone, but there was times when
Speaker 3: another female colleague was taking her back and forth to
Speaker 3: the bathroom.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that when she was left alone for that
Speaker 1: time in that room, that there was actually still a
Speaker 1: police officer, he said, outside the door while she was
Speaker 1: being allowed to sort of make those communications now.
Speaker 3: Yes, so Jane Warren was reminding the jury and the witness,
Speaker 3: of course, that Ian Wilkinson had said that their meals,
Speaker 3: the four lunch guests were served on uniform large gray
Speaker 3: dinner plates and then the accused had a smaller orange
Speaker 3: e tan plate.
Speaker 4: So let's hear a little bit more of the evidence.
Speaker 1: This is the words of Detective Eppingstall Jane Warren, and
Speaker 1: you'll also hear Colin Mandy at the end.
Speaker 5: Now, I also want to ask you about we heard
Speaker 5: evidence during the trials some time ago from Ian Wilkinson
Speaker 5: that when they had the lunch on July, their meals,
Speaker 5: that is his Heathers, dinond Gales were all served on
Speaker 5: uniform large gray dinner plates. Yes, and he said that
Speaker 5: the accused meal was served on a smaller orange e
Speaker 5: tan colored plate.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 5: I've heard evidence this morning that there was a video
Speaker 5: of the search warrant taken prior to the search being
Speaker 5: conducted on five August.
Speaker 2: Yes, ma'am, you viewed that video, yes, I have yet.
Speaker 5: And that video includes observations made throughout the accused kitchen,
Speaker 5: is that right, yes, yeah, and that includes observations made
Speaker 5: of each cupboard and each draw in the accused kitchen,
Speaker 5: it does, yes, And inside the dishwasher, yes, ma'am. And
Speaker 5: we've seen some images extracted from that video which include
Speaker 5: inside the dishwasher and inside some draws. Is that right?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 4: Correct?
Speaker 5: In the remainder of that video or videos, were there
Speaker 5: any gray plates captured which matched the description of the
Speaker 5: four gray plates that Ian Wilkinson described in his evidence.
Speaker 2: No, not that I observed.
Speaker 5: No, did police ever recover four gray plates from the
Speaker 5: accused address?
Speaker 6: I object to that question, your honor.
Speaker 1: Now, after Colin Mandy made this objection, he sort of
Speaker 1: started to speak, and Justice Bill cut him off in
Speaker 1: a way and said, mister Mandy, maybe should the jury
Speaker 1: leave the room for this.
Speaker 4: So the jury did leave.
Speaker 1: The room, and then they later returned and the evidence continued.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 3: They then were speaking a little bit more about the
Speaker 3: phone and what happened to the phone after Aaron Patterson
Speaker 3: handed it over, and the detective explained that his memory
Speaker 3: of it was he took it back to the homicide
Speaker 3: squad office and secured it in in a lock up
Speaker 3: area there that he was the only one that had
Speaker 3: control over. And after he was explaining that piece of evidence,
Speaker 3: the questioning then shifted to Aaron Patterson's police interview.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so the jury was told by Justice Bill that
Speaker 1: this interview, the time stamps on it changed slightly, but
Speaker 1: that that is not something that they need to take
Speaker 1: into consideration, just to watch it as a piece of evidence.
Speaker 4: And they were told this commenced at.
Speaker 1: Four forty one pm on the fifth of August twenty
Speaker 1: twenty three, so that's just in the afternoon following this
Speaker 1: search warrants being conducted. Now, this interview, you began with
Speaker 1: a Detective epping Stall in the room along with another
Speaker 1: police officer who was referred to as a corroborator, taking
Speaker 1: some notes. And in the footage you could see Aaron Patterson.
Speaker 1: She was sort of the closest to the camera on
Speaker 1: the right hand side. It was really quite close up
Speaker 1: of the side of her face.
Speaker 3: You could see her from the chest up Penny.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and she was sitting with her hair down in
Speaker 1: sort of a light colored jumper answering these answering these
Speaker 1: questions and will be taking you through in the rest
Speaker 1: of this episode excerpts of what was plagued to the
Speaker 1: jury and this police interview and the voices that you'll
Speaker 1: be hearing are this detective Detective epping Stall as well
Speaker 1: as Aaron Patterson. So it began with the police officer
Speaker 1: establishing the time that it was being recorded and did
Speaker 1: Aaron Patterson understand different rights.
Speaker 4: That she had.
Speaker 3: She was also asked to state her full name, Penny.
Speaker 3: That was one of the first questions that she was asked.
Speaker 3: The jury was shown and she replied, Aaron Trudy Patterson.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and she gave her date of birth, she gave
Speaker 1: her address. When she was asked, you know, have you
Speaker 1: had the opportunity to speak to a so listener, she
Speaker 1: confirmed yes that she had, and she was told by
Speaker 1: Detective epping Stall, now, the rights that you have in
Speaker 1: this interview, which include not having to answer questions, they
Speaker 1: remain with you for the entire time. You remain with us,
Speaker 1: so that at any point she could sort of go
Speaker 1: back to this list of rights that she'd been given
Speaker 1: about consulting a solicitor and other things, and that that
Speaker 1: was all part of her right in this particular interview
Speaker 1: room at the time. But after these sort of particulars
Speaker 1: were established, it turned to why the detectives wanted to
Speaker 1: speak to her that day and we might play you
Speaker 1: an excerpt. Now this is the words of Detective epping
Speaker 1: Stall and Aaron Patterson.
Speaker 4: It's not their voices.
Speaker 2: We want to discuss the deaths of Heather Wilkinson and
Speaker 2: Gail Patterson with you.
Speaker 3: Yep.
Speaker 2: When we were at the house, we discussed you hadn't
Speaker 2: really been kept in the loop and it came as
Speaker 2: news to you that both Gail and Heather had passed away.
Speaker 2: They all became so ill and ended up in the
Speaker 2: intensive care unit at the Dandinong Hospital and then the
Speaker 2: Austin Hospital. Following that, they had period of deterioration in
Speaker 2: their conditions and they have become so ill that their
Speaker 2: livers have failed. Don underwent a liver transplant last night. Oh,
Speaker 2: and Heather and Gail have subsequently passed away. Ian, I
Speaker 2: don't have a current prognosis update on where he's at.
Speaker 2: We're trying to understand what made them so ill. Conversely,
Speaker 2: we're trying to understand why you're not that ill. Do
Speaker 2: you understand why we're interviewing you today?
Speaker 6: Hm, I'm sure you understand. I've never been in a
Speaker 6: situation like this before, and I've been very very helpful
Speaker 6: with the health department during the week because I wanted
Speaker 6: to be help that side of things as much as possible,
Speaker 6: because I do want to know what happens. So I've
Speaker 6: given them as much information as they've asked for and
Speaker 6: offered up all the food and all the information about
Speaker 6: where the food came from.
Speaker 2: I fully understand that. I must say you were very
Speaker 2: helpful at the house, helped us with the investigation, mainly
Speaker 2: the fruit platter Heather gave you and the gravy you kept,
Speaker 2: you said on advice from the Health Department, so thank you.
Speaker 2: You also pointed out a recipe book on the counter,
Speaker 2: page two hundred and fifty two, the recipe for beef Wellington,
Speaker 2: and indicated that as the recipe. Now.
Speaker 1: From there, the discussion turned to Asian and Indian foods
Speaker 1: and we heard a little bit more from Aaron Patterson
Speaker 1: about those.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Eppingstall was explaining in this interview that Aaron Patterson
Speaker 3: had been really helpful at the house pointing out this
Speaker 3: recipe book and I like, but he said, we didn't
Speaker 3: really see many items from an Asian or Indian grocers stores.
Speaker 3: And she was also asked about her second house, which
Speaker 3: she has in Mount Waverley, and we heard that police
Speaker 3: had also had a search warrant for that property later
Speaker 3: that same day, and her response was, No, I'd had
Speaker 3: a big clear out of the pantry the last time
Speaker 3: she'd been at that Mount Waverley home, and you wouldn't
Speaker 3: you wouldn't really find much food that was like that there.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And she also when she was sort of asked about
Speaker 1: those particular types of food, she said, have looked in
Speaker 1: my fridge sort of. When they were talking initially about
Speaker 1: this Lee and Gatha home, the conversation continued around this
Speaker 1: Mount Waverley address again and whether she was actually considering
Speaker 1: selling that property, and Detective epping Stall sort of prompted
Speaker 1: her on that, and then she started to talk about
Speaker 1: the fact that potentially she might have hoped it was
Speaker 1: somewhere that her son could stay when he went to
Speaker 1: university in a few years.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: She confirmed that she'd studied at Monash University years earlier
Speaker 3: and had hoped that one of her children might have
Speaker 3: studied there. But she explained to the investigators that her
Speaker 3: son wanted to be a pilot and there was a
Speaker 3: possibility that they may sell that house and repurchase in
Speaker 3: a different area.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she mentioned a sort of wanting to maybe purchase
Speaker 1: at Philip Islands to be a bit closer to where
Speaker 1: their activities were at the moment. And then the next
Speaker 1: part of the interview sort of moved again to trying
Speaker 1: to work out the investigators where the mushrooms might have
Speaker 1: actually come from, as well as asking Aaron Patterson a
Speaker 1: little bit about why she'd had these people over for lunch. Now,
Speaker 1: this is what the jury heard from the police interview.
Speaker 1: It's no one's real voice.
Speaker 2: Obviously, we've got concerns of relation to the mushrooms and
Speaker 2: where they've come from. Is that something you've done in
Speaker 2: the past, foraging for mushrooms? No, never do you have
Speaker 2: a dehydrate or anything like that. You've described to me
Speaker 2: the relationship with your ex partner, Simon. Can you please
Speaker 2: explain why you'd have his parents and uncle and auntie
Speaker 2: over for lunch.
Speaker 6: They've always been very good to me, and I want
Speaker 6: to maintain those relationships despite of what's happening with Simon.
Speaker 6: I love them a lot. They've always been really good
Speaker 6: to me and they've always said to me they would
Speaker 6: support me with love and emotional support even though Simon
Speaker 6: and I have separated, and I really appreciated that because
Speaker 6: my parents are both gone and my grandparents are all gone.
Speaker 6: They're the only family that I've got. They're the only
Speaker 6: grandparents that my children have, and I want them to
Speaker 6: stay in my kids' lives. That's really important to me.
Speaker 6: I think Simon hated that I love them. Thing he's
Speaker 6: ever done to me will change the fact that they're good,
Speaker 6: decent people that have never done anything wrong by me.
Speaker 1: Ever, while we're watching this particular interview from what the
Speaker 1: listeners have just heard, when asked about the second time
Speaker 1: if she'd ever owned a dehydrator, Aaron Patterson, there was
Speaker 1: a silence, so she sort of shook her head but
Speaker 1: didn't verbally respond. And then in the bigger sort of
Speaker 1: answer that everyone has just heard, where she's talking about
Speaker 1: her relationship to the lunch guests and to Simon and
Speaker 1: these were her family, she did seem to be.
Speaker 4: Quite wavery in the voice at that point.
Speaker 3: There was a lot of the audio that really couldn't
Speaker 3: we really couldn't understand today. There was a lot of
Speaker 3: inaudible parts where you could see Aaron Patterson nodding her
Speaker 3: head or at times she would sip from a cup
Speaker 3: that she had in front of her and she sort
Speaker 3: of leaned forward. There was further nods of their head
Speaker 3: and at some point her eyebrows would raise in response
Speaker 3: to some of the questions. But yeah, there certain parts
Speaker 3: that were quite difficult to hear. Responses we couldn't quite hear,
Speaker 3: but there were there's a lot of yeses and ms
Speaker 3: that we could hear, and that continued in this next
Speaker 3: line of questioning.
Speaker 1: So then Aaron Patterson was asked about going to Lee
Speaker 1: and Gatha Hospital, leaving the conversations that she'd had with
Speaker 1: doctor Chris Webster, and then the police came to say
Speaker 1: to her that they had found a manual for a
Speaker 1: sunbeam dehydrator in one of these draws that she was searching.
Speaker 1: So we'll go back to a little bit more of
Speaker 1: the interview here.
Speaker 2: Do you own a dehydrator?
Speaker 6: No, nop. I've got manuals of lots of stuff I've
Speaker 6: collected over the years.
Speaker 2: When did you own a dehydrator?
Speaker 6: I don't own one. When I first got a Thermo mix,
Speaker 6: I got really excited about making everything from scratch. I'd
Speaker 6: get lots of everything from scratch ingredients and I did
Speaker 6: a lot of that.
Speaker 1: We'll bring you more from inside the court room in
Speaker 1: our next episode. Thank you for listening to this episode
Speaker 1: of Say Grace. Please press the follow button in your
Speaker 1: app to get our next episodes as soon as we publish.
Speaker 3: For more reporting on the case, check out the Age
Speaker 3: of nine News in your browser or app store.
Speaker 1: To acknowledge the traditional owners of the land that this
Speaker 1: podcast was recorded on and wherever you're listening to it now.
Speaker 4: Say Grace is created and hosted by me Penelope Lesh
Speaker 4: and me Erin Peerson. This podcast is produced by Genevieve Rule.